Hyderabad: Faculty members of technical colleges have urged managements to clear unpaid salaries, which in many cases have been pending for two to six months, ahead of the Dasara festival. They expressed frustration over managements blaming delayed govt fee reimbursements instead of paying staff from other student fees.

“We have not received salaries since June. Most colleges are not paying regularly and cite govt reimbursement delays when we ask for our dues,” said G Balaji, a former mechanical engineer, switched to teaching five years ago.

Faculty pointed out that, except for the top 20 colleges in the state, most technical institutions are defaulting on salaries. While some colleges pay staff in computer science and allied branches, those in conventional branches are often left unpaid.

“There are colleges that owe salaries for the past nine months. Managements are barely present on campuses, fearing staff will demand their dues. At least now, they should pay so we can celebrate Dasara,” said A Santosh Kumar, president of the Telangana Schools Technical Colleges Employees Association.

College managements, however, said they are also waiting for the state govt to release reimbursement dues before salaries can be paid to the faculty.

“In the meeting on Sept 15, the govt promised to release dues within three to four days. Nothing has been released so far. Around 60% of our fee collection depends on govt reimbursements, so we too are waiting,” said Nagaiah Chowdary of the Federation of Associations of Telangana Higher Institutions.